Flaw Salad

During one quiet hour, in the safety of tangled sheets, she explained to him—or tried to—how easy people are to read, how quickly the end becomes visible, how we all follow patterns as predictable as the moon.

He said she was arrogant. It was arrogant for her to grant herself powers of divination. Arrogant to judge. Arrogant to think people are nothing but patterns.

He was right, of course. One shouldn’t say such things aloud.

Later she would remember that moment, not because of the verbiage. She remembered the loneliness and the heartbreak. All the love she felt couldn’t stop her from knowing, right then, for the first time, that there would be an end to their quiet hours. They had a finite number of kisses left, and the countdown had begun.

She was right, of course.

So, she once again found herself standing in vast, empty plains. In every direction, a horizon littered with red flags, and she thought blind, foolish love is the most enviable thing in the world.